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THE PIG DIARY
3. Elio's Diary
The following is a modified extract, from a diary kept by a worker,
in Bunge Industries Ltd's intensive piggery, at Corowa in New South
Wales, during 1991.
two of her piglets can hardly move, the front leg of one is broken,
the other is dragging the back half of his body, when the sow is
moved out of the pen, she is kicked with full force & hit in the head
& body by swinging the gate, this is called 'gate-bashing', m carries a
black baton, he hits the pigs for no apparent reason, as he walks up
& down the aisles, one piglet tries to escape, but is trapped between
the pen partitions, p tries to pull the piglet out by the rear, with as
much force as he can, but the piglet is wedged in by the head, the
squealing is piercing, p says, 'the silly cunts do stupid things from
time to time', m says, 'just kill the stupid cunt', dead piglets are in
several pens, others are definitely injured, i am told by j, 'if the
piglets won't move, hit them in the head with the edge of the board',
p picks up a shifting spanner & hits a sow repeatedly on top on the
head, many of the boars & sows have difficulty standing, because of
the slippery floor & their excessive weight, the distressed piglets are
often picked up by their ears & thrown into the aisle, if piglets turn
back & go the wrong way, they are simply kicked, sometimes in the
head, for a second time, a piglet gets his head stuck between the
pen partitions, j kicks the piglet in the head until he is freed, once
back in the pens, they are kicked in the stomach with full force, m
who carries the black baton, is hitting pigs because they are noisy,
he hits a sow seven times on the head, pauses for about three
seconds, & then hits her again another six times, the sow has no
room to move away, she just stands there squealing, punishment of
pigs is by kicking, punching, slamming gates into their heads &
beating with a baton occurs frequently during mating sessions, i see
m swing the scraper like a cricket bat, into the head of one pig, & j
gate bashes several pigs & kicks a boar in the stomach, j says 'the
boar was going mad & we had to beat the shit out of it', i notice a
sow in the boar shed, with a swollen ear the size of a small pillow & a
badly injured eye, she has not been attended to, m comes over &
throws a baton to me & says, 'just beat the fuck out of it', then he
says, 'stick your finger in one of her eyes', i reply, 'you're not serious
are you?', he says, 'fucking oath, it's the only way to move these
cunts', he strikes a boar with his steel scraper, at least ten times to
the head, mouth & body, the boar is screaming & trying to escape
the blows, but d keeps going for him, d sees me looking & says,
'that'll teach the cunt', j tells us that b from the farrowing house,
prods the boar on the testicles, with an electric prodder & that's why
he goes mad, s mentions a piglet that has become stuck in a sewer
trench under d line, s says, 'the stupid cunt's been there all weekend',
he is squealing continuously, the others laugh, while going through
the weaners shed i see some dead, injured & lame piglets, s says t
has been reprimanded, for kicking one of the piglets approx. one
metre into the air, m kicks a pig in the head, with full force, at least
ten times, this pig has to back up the aisle whilst he is being kicked,
b kicks a sow in the stomach six times, because she won't mate, b is
in a kicking mood, he kicks several sows, s picks up one sick piglet
near death by the feet & swings him onto the concrete floor head
first, this kills him instantly, i watch j for about a minute, while he
chases a sow around the pen, kicking her across the eyes & in the
stomach with karate type kicks, he is saying, 'you dumb fucking slut',
i see m chase an escaped sow, he jumps onto her in the aisle &
repeatedly kicks her in the head, until she moves back to her pen, he
hits them with a black baton & kicks them, he also holds the baton
like a dagger & thrusts it into the sows' faces, i check them later &
two are bleeding from the eyes, j hits the pigs so hard with the baton
he bends it, he hits a sow with the gate, causing her to bleed from
the mouth, m says, 'i just beat the fuck out of the boar, because he
wouldn't root, he won't be rooting tomorrow, his balls will be red raw',
the muscles & intestines of another sow are falling out of her anus,
she is surrounded by dead piglets, t comes over & says, 'just beat the
fuck out of them', a lame sow is trying to drag herself down the aisle,
b is kicking her to hurry her along, she is moving as fast as she can, i
move her outside whilst b gets a rifle, he shoots her, but she keeps
moving for about two minutes, b stands & watches, the sow tries to
get up, she moves her head off the ground, eventually her
movements cease & she dies, j looks at me & says, 'you like the
cunts don't you', i reply, 'you don't have to hit my boars', he says,
'you've got to teach the dirty cunts a lesson', i crouch by a sick sow,
she appears to be in a lot of pain, she is quivering & fretting, i
stroke her neck, she opens her eyes & looks at me briefly, before
closing them again, i apologise to her & say goodbye, for the first
time i am nearly in tears, she is almost dead, i go & clean the boar
shed, ten minutes later, i see m get the rifle & take it to the sow
house, i assume he shoots the sow, there is a sow in a line, lame in
the back legs, b tries to move her by kicking her to the hind quarters
& head, the sow tries frantically to move, but with limited success,
she is screaming, b is swearing, b then gets in front of her & begins
pulling & twisting her ears, he is saying, 'move you fucking slut, fuck
you, i'll fix you up if you don't fucking move', b is becoming
increasingly frustrated & the sow distressed, b then kicks her in the
head & says, 'fuck you', he walks off & comes back with a steel hook,
used to drag dead pigs, he puts the hook up the sow's vagina & drags
her, he says, 'that'll teach you you stupid fucking slut', beatings occur
frequently during mating, j tells me he has hit a pig across the nose
with the steel rod, i asks him if the pig is okay, he replies, 'i've
probably busted his nose, i hate these fucking pigs', he uses the steel
rod about ten times on each pig, when the sows are back in their
pens, he jabs them with his texta about five times to the eye area,
he uses the end of the baton to gauge the pigs eyes, b loses his
]temper & kicks the pigs indiscriminately as hard as he can, he says,
'these cunts give me the shits, sometimes you have to kick the fuck
out of them', one of the boars in my care only has one testicle, j tells
me that on the weekend shift, s has kicked him so hard, that one of
his testicles has disappeared, j bashes several pigs, i lose count of
the number of times & the pigs, the boars in the pen are saturated by
water nipples that have leaked, j comments, 'i know i'm cruel
sometimes, but i can't stand seeing things like this happen to the
poor cunts', he then lets the boars out into the mating area, away
from the spraying nipple, there are two sows in the boar shed, that
have been gashed badly in the vaginal area, just before lunch, b
shows me one of the sows & opens the wound with his fingers, he
says, 'how would you like to fuck that?', he & m laugh, i am told to
help take pigs to the finishing shed, four of the pigs are obviously
injured & their journey of approx. four hundred metres must be
extremely painful, i have to walk very slowly because of this, one sow
is bleeding from three hooves, leaving blood on the path as she
walks, one hoof is broken & just hanging on, i have to stop for her
frequently, she seems to run out of breath, because of my slow pace
m catches up with me, with another twenty pigs suffering from
injuries & illnesses, he is using his baton, to move the pigs forward,
he tells me to keep going, i have to leave the pig with the bleeding
hoof behind, because she has stopped & does not want to move, all
the pigs are then crowded into one pen, m says, 'they're going to be
killed anyway', then adds, 'that's if they don't die first' |
